


Nothing Loved Is Ever Lost

by pendragonally



Category: Merlin (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Angst, Boys Kissing, Fluff and Humor, Grief/Mourning, Happy Ending, I'm Bad At Tagging, I'm Sorry, Immortal Merlin (Merlin), M/M, Mentions of drugs, Moving On, Past Character Death, Reincarnation, Reunited and It Feels So Good, Suicidal Thoughts, it's in there i promise, metions of drinking
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-18
Updated: 2020-11-18
Packaged: 2021-03-10 05:20:54
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,295
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27618263
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/pendragonally/pseuds/pendragonally
Summary: It’s been fifteen hundred years and Merlin is still waiting. Still wandering, still hoping… still lost without his king, his soulmate— hisArthur.
Relationships: Merlin/Arthur Pendragon (Merlin)
Comments: 16
Kudos: 117





	Nothing Loved Is Ever Lost

**Author's Note:**

> Hello everyone! I'm back again!
> 
> I know the 'Merlin spends a thousand years mourning Arthur' is a done to death (no pun intended) trope but here I am doing it anyway because I couldn't help myself. I've fallen in love with these two idiots and can't seem to stop writing about them so, here we are.  
> This hasn't been beta-read and might be a bit repetitive thanks to me writing it in the middle of the night but please excuse any mistakes.  
> Thank you to everyone showing love and support on my other works, I hope you enjoy this one too! ♡
> 
> **Additional warnings: brief mentions of nudity (there's no sexual content in this fic). also the mentions of alcohol/pills/suicidal thoughts are very brief, too.**

*****

_Arthur is not just a King, he is the Once and Future King._

_When Albion’s need is greatest, Arthur will rise again._

Arthur will rise again.

Rise again.

Over the centuries, Merlin has lost count of how many times he’s repeated Kilgharrah’s final words to him. Whenever he’s been scared or lonely, out of his mind with alcohol and missing Arthur more than ever— sometimes, those words have been Merlin’s only source of real comfort during his unfathomably long life.

Arthur will rise again.

Except… _Except_ —

It’s been fifteen hundred years and Merlin is still waiting. Still wandering, still hoping… still lost without his king, his soulmate— his _Arthur_.

It’s not like Merlin hasn’t tried— he _has_ tried. So many times. Tried to let go, tried to move on. He's even come close to falling in love a few times but in the end it’s never enough because it’s never the same. Arthur left his mark on Merlin’s soul, there’s a hole in the world without him and nothing Merlin does or says can erase that.

He doesn’t remember losing him, not properly anyway. He can’t remember what Arthur’s chain mail looked like stained with blood, can’t remember the weight of him in his arms but he remembers the _feeling_. Remembers feeling stained, empty, broken, remembers how he cried so hard he almost vomited up his own soul the day he realised he couldn’t properly recall _Arthur_ either.

Long gone is the memory of the sound of his laughter, the shape of his smile, even the colour of his eyes. All Merlin remembers now is that they were blue. So blue he could barely stand to look away.

All Merlin remembers of Arthur now is how much he loved him— how much he _still_ loves him. How much he wishes that when Kilgharrah had told him that Arthur would rise again— _that_ he remembers, word for word— it had been the truth.

Instead it has turned out to be nothing but a lie, a shadow that crept inside him and chased away the light- _Arthur’s_ light. Until all that remains is darkness and the echo of what was.

The world has been torn apart so many times in Merlin’s existence, and yet Arthur has never returned, has never brought his light back now matter how desperate things have been— no matter how desperate _Merlin_ has been.

Merlin wishes he knew how to die.

Over the years (decades, _centuries_ ) he’s tried everything. Despite knowing that it wouldn’t work, _knowing_ that he’s forever cursed to walk this world alone, Merlin has tried so hard to die he sometimes thinks of nothing else.

He doesn’t even have his magic to comfort him. Merlin’s magic had loved Arthur —would love him still, Merlin likes to think— and so when Merlin grieved the loss of his beloved king, his magic grieved with him, reaching out over and over for someone who simply wasn’t there anymore.

Eventually it gave up, and just like his memories of Arthur and Camelot, his magic faded from within him too.

So Merlin can’t die, even without his magic it seems, but that doesn't stop him doing things that give him the illusion that he can.

Every night he drinks. So much alcohol he can barely stand, and every night he chokes down endless pills dry until he’s nauseous and delirious.

Tonight is no different.

Merlin stumbles from his humble abode, down to the lake that he both loves and despises but can’t stray too far away from no matter how many times he tries. Sometimes he leaves for a few days, others a few months but in the end—

He always returns to this.

Inebriated and still half out of his mind with grief (and over the counter drugs) Merlin collapses by the waters edge, smooth as glass and almost black in the darkness, wraps his arms around his knees and _sobs_.

Waiting for a man who exists now only in the pages of history.

“Why did you lie to me Kilgharrah?” he shouts fruitlessly to the night sky. “ _Why?_ I want him back! Do you hear me? Just bring him _back!_ ”

The stars remain silent, and Merlin is crippled with sorrow all over again. “Please Arthur, come back to me,” he begs, blinded by tears he lays down on his back, shivering, lost, and so _alone_. “I can’t do this without you,”

He can’t— doesn’t want to. But he _will_ , because he has no choice. Merlin has _never_ had a choice.

In the end his tears run dry and he simply lingers there, stares at the star studded sky, listens to the gentle lapping of water against the bank and hums a tune that he knows but doesn’t remember.

“ _Merlin_ ,”

When the first whisper comes, Merlin ignores it. It wouldn’t be the first time he’s gotten blind drunk, heard Arthur’s voice in the dark and followed only to be led down yet another path to nowhere.

Tonight though, it’s different.

Tonight the whispers grow louder, more insistent until— “Do not ignore your king, Merlin.”

Bolting upright so fast his head spins, Merlin squints out at the lake, chest heaving when he realises that the water is no longer still but _shifting_ , rolling in waves like the ocean before a storm, and there, a few feet from the shore is—

Before he knows what he’s doing, before he can really even process what’s happening, Merlin is staggering to his feet and all but throwing himself into the lake, the cold water prickling his skin as he wades out to meet the figure already walking towards him.

He stops dead a little more than arm's length away, heart in his throat because for the first time in endless lifetimes, standing right there in front of him is, “Arthur,” the word is little more than a whisper, a choked gasp lodged somewhere in the back of his throat.

Arthur is completely bare, water running in rivulets down his skin and glinting silver in the bright light of the full moon shining high above them, mirrored in the water that has stilled now, covering Arthur to his hips. He looks ethereal, Merlin thinks, like something from a dream that makes him ache so deeply in his soul he can’t help but reach out because he has to _know_.

He has to know that this is real, that Arthur really is here with him.

Merlin doesn’t think about what Arthur’s reaction might be, how _improper_ this will all seem to a man who has been missing from the world for too many lifetimes to count, he doesn’t spare a thought to what it will look like to anyone who might be taking their dog for a late night walk around the lake— Merlin _has to know_.

So he swallows hard and reaches out, lets the very tips of his shaking fingers touch the top of Arthur’s left arm, presses harder when Arthur doesn’t stop him, merely watches Merlin run his fingertips inwards, across his chest until he reaches where his heart is. Laying his palm flat against Arthur’s chest and feeling the strong, steady _thump thump thump_ of his heart Merlin breaks. “Arthur how is this— I mean you’re really… _Arthur,_ ”

“Merlin,” Arthur says, quiet and low in the still of the night. The sound has Merlin sobbing, tears hot on his face and head spinning because Arthur is _here_. He’s here and he’s saying Merlin’s name in that way he always secretly adored and he’s still the most beautiful thing Merlin has ever seen.

He’s so familiar Merlin wonders how he ever forgot any of it for even a second.

“Is this— are you real?”

Though Arthur’s face is shrouded partly in shadow, Merlin can see the way his lips quirk up in a small smile. “What does that even mean?”

“Everything. Nothing. It doesn’t matter now—" Merlin can’t help but let his gaze drop to Arthur’s side, to the place where, the last time they were together, Arthur was bleeding from a wound that even Merlin’s magic could not heal. His fingers follow the invisible trail, down, down, feeling nothing but smooth skin where there was once the mark of the end of Merlin’s world as he knew it. “I’m sorry Arthur, I’m _so sorry!_ ”

When Arthur takes a step closer and pulls him into his arms, Merlin goes easily, lets himself be held, ignores Arthur’s nudity, the way his own clothes are growing heavy with water and the fact that they’re standing in a lake in the middle of the night and chooses instead to simply _feel_.

Feel the strength of Arthur’s arms around his shaking body, the warmth of his skin despite how cold the water is and the way his whole body shivers when Arthur whispers, “It is I who should be sorry, Merlin-"

Merlin shakes his head against Arthur’s shoulder. “Don’t be sorry Arthur, just _be here_.” Please be here always. I’m never letting you go again.

“I am here,”

“But _why_? Why now?” Merlin asks in a rush when reality slithers back in and chases away the light of having Arthur back with shadows of what that might mean for the world- for _him_ . “If they’ve sent you back just to take you from me again because destiny decides that—” he trails off, pulls back and shakes his head because his heart is threatening to splinter just at the thought of it. “I can’t lose you twice, Arthur. I _can’t_.”

“You never lost me, Merlin.” Arthur sounds gentler than ever before. “You never will.”

Merlin wants to smile but he can’t quite muster the strength. “I don’t understand, Arthur, where is your armour, your sword?”

“I no longer need them,”

Merlin frowns, he’s more confused than possibly ever before. “But Albion will need you to—”

“ _Albion_ ,” Arthur interrupts, “is standing right in front of me.”

“I don’t understand.” Merlin repeats, isn’t entirely sure this whole thing isn’t just some elaborate, confusing dream that he understands as clearly as he used to understand Kilgharrah’s riddles. “Destiny foretold that when Albion’s need is greatest, the Once and Future King will rise again, and you’re here so that must mean that Albion is in need now more than ever before.”

Arthur rolls his eyes at him, and the action is so achingly familiar Merlin wants to cry again. “You always were an idiot, Merlin.” He teases, bringing his hands to Merlin’s face, thumbs stroking across his cheeks in an intimacy they’ve never shared before. “You _are_ Albion, Merlin, I’m here for _you_.”

“We should go inside,” Merlin says because all other words have escaped him so he falls back on practicality. “Get you warm and dry.”

“I can’t, Merlin.”

Merlin laughs, a trembling little thing that’s soon swallowed up by the frigid night air. “Don’t be ridiculous, you can’t stay out here all night.”

“I have to,”

“But why?” Merlin is lost all over again. “You just said that you’re here for me so—”

“I _am_ here for you,” Arthur looks at him in a way he’s sure he never has before. Not with pity but with _sorrow_. So much sorrow— Arthur’s eyes should never look like that. “I’m here to help you let go,”

“Let go of what?”

“Me,”

Merlin’s blood turns to ice the same way it did the day Arthur died. “Why would I need to let you go? You only just got here.”

“And yet in your heart you know I can’t stay.” Arthur says softly. So softly, almost as though he’s talking to a frightened child. “I don’t belong here anymore, and neither do you.”

Merlin wishes the ice had never thawed.

He shakes his head in disbelief, starts crying again. “No, you don’t mean that. You _can’t_. I’ve been waiting for you Arthur, waiting for so long!”

“Do you think I want to leave you like this? Leave you at all?” Arthur sounds as stricken as Merlin feels. “It’s not for us to decide, Merlin. It never was,”

“But I _love_ you!” Merlin cries, heartbroken in a way he didn't know he could still be. “I don’t want to be without you anymore,”

Arthur pulls him back into his arms and holds him tighter than ever. “I _know_ , Merlin. And I love you too—“

“Then _stay_ with me,” Merlin hiccups, clinging to Arthur in the hope that if he holds tight enough, then he’ll get to keep him. “ _Please_ ,”

“Your soul is so tired, Merlin, I know because mine is too.” Arthur pulls away slightly and Merlin wonders if the pain shining brightly in those eyes he adores so much is just a reflection of his own— a fabrication just like everything else. “You linger here like a ghost and you deserve so much more than that. I _want_ more than that for you, which is why you need to leave. Go and be who you’re meant to be,”

“I’m meant to be _your_ servant, I _am_ your servant.”

Arthur smiles fondly. “No Merlin, you were always so much more than that.”

“This can’t be the last time I ever see you,” Merlin doesn't want to believe it, yet he can feel the inevitable anyway. Knows that the end will come no matter how much you wish it wouldn’t. “None of this is real, is it? How else am I not freezing to death?” he sighs, resigned.

“It’s as real as you want it to be,” Arthur answers quietly. “Swear to me that you’ll leave this place, Merlin, that you’ll move on with your life.” He sounds urgent now. Merlin knows they’re running out of time. “Swear to me that you’ll live, that you’ll do all the things you love— that you’ll _fall_ in love some day. Swear to me that even if only until Fate grants us another chance- you’ll _let me go_.”

Merlin has never been able to deny Arthur much of anything. “I swear,” his voice cracks around the words and his heart splits, but he means it.

“Now close your eyes,”

Merlin does as he’s asked, shivers when Arthur’s lips meet his in a brief, tender kiss.

“Arthur I—“ he opens his eyes and whatever he was going to say dies in his throat because Arthur is no longer there.

Perhaps he never was. Merlin looks around the lake to find that there is no lake at all, just heavy fog and melancholy that has blanketed this place for far too long. The lake was filled in too many years ago to count, moss, grass and earth now where clear still water once was. Merlin somehow forgot that as well as everything else.

Or maybe he’s known all along, and the reality of it all is just too painful to think about.

Avalon is gone, and with it the magic that can bring Arthur back.

Merlin wraps his arms around himself (still feels the phantom echo of Arthur’s embrace) and bursts into tears, mourning the loss of him all over again. The king is dead and he’s never coming back.

It’s time to move on— there’s nothing left for him here.

The truth is finally clear to him.

The truth is that Merlin has never spoken of Arthur Pendragon to anybody. Not even to the people he’s loved and lost in the spaces between wanting Arthur back more than anything and allowing himself something that at least resembled moving on— for a while at least.

Instead he watched the evolution of Man and the true fading of magic. He witnessed war; famine and disease, listened quietly as the story of King Arthur slowly became myth that then dissolved into legend.

At times Merlin was tempted to go to somebody, anybody, and tell them the truth of the kingdom of Camelot and the life he’d had there. Tell the world the loyalty of the knights, the courage and beauty of Queen Guinevere; pass on the wisdom of Gaius, the old physician who had been like a father to him. And of course, the story of Arthur himself, the _real_ story, of the prince he was and the king he became— the man he’d always been underneath it all.

But over the centuries Merlin’s heart has become the deepest ocean of secrets, and the truths of some stories are best left unspoken. Arthur isn’t lost to the pages of history and the pieces of Merlin’s memory that refuse to be forgotten, because after all, nothing loved is never truly lost.

And Arthur _was_ loved. By all who knew him and especially by the half of Merlin’s soul that he’d willingly offered to him the day he walked into Camelot.

Merlin swallows hard, exhales shakily and kneels down on the soft earth that was once the still waters of the lake of Avalon. Slowly, carefully, he digs into the spongy moss with his bare hands. It gives easily, and in only a few minutes he has a small, almost perfectly circular hole.

Reaching into his pocket, Merlin retrieves the single link to his king he’s kept with him all this time; the sigil that Arthur gifted to him on a night Arthur had believed to be his last.

“I hope we meet again,” Merlin whispers, pressing a kiss to the sigil before setting it down carefully in the hole. To be hidden by the earth forever or some day discovered and put on display for the world to see? Merlin has no idea. He cannot after all, see the future. “I will always love you, Arthur, but I have to let you go now.”

All Merlin knows now is that in his heart this feels right.

For a brief moment he thinks of _what ifs_ — what if he’d ridden to Camlann faster. What if he’d found Mordred before Mordred found Arthur?

What if he’d been there for Morgana when she was frightened of her magic? What if he’d never gone to Camelot in the first place?

What if he’d told Arthur who he really was so much sooner?

“I love you just the way you are, Merlin,” is what Arthur has always whispered to him in his dreams.

“No more secrets. Not between us,” Arthur might have said.

“Idiot,” Arthur probably would have said. The thought makes Merlin’s breath hitch and his heart skip as he stands, shoulders the bags he’s had packed for a while (that he doesn't remember taking down to the lake with him) and turns from Avalon for the last time.

This time, when he walks away from all that’s left of what was, Merlin doesn’t look back. He doesn’t pray for the Gods to bring Arthur back to him.

No, this time, though there are tears on his face and a tiny shiver in his soul as it realises what he's doing, what he’s about to leave behind, Merlin looks up at the rising sun, feels its warmth on his skin and for the first time in too many years to count—

He greets the dawn with a smile.

_I always thought you were the bravest man I ever met._

It’s time for Merlin to show himself what Arthur already knew.

*****

In what seems like little more than the blink of an eye the better part of three decades pass.

The world has changed all over again, modern day now truly embracing what is known as the digital age. The world has always changed with time, shaped and altered by people walking paths both new and old but this time— _this time_ ,

Merlin has changed, too.

He’s lived more in the last few decades than he has in centuries. He’s worked hard, spends his money on something other than _existing_ and he’s had fun, ridden roller-coasters until he almost vomited and learned how to fly a plane just for the hell of it, laughed and loved and laughed some more. Now?

Well now Merlin is changing again.

His magic never did return to him and so he’s gotten used to only staying in one place until it starts to become obvious that he isn’t aging. For the first time, he doesn’t really mind because now he’s really, genuinely doing something with his life that actually feels a lot like living it— being young forever doesn’t sound so bad.

And if he still sometimes (occasionally, in tiny moments of weakness that he refuses to feel guilty for) dreams of golden blonde hair, sapphire blue eyes and a smile brighter than the sun, well that’s okay too, just little bumps in the long, long road of never-ending journey.

Merlin moves into a new house on a beautiful summer’s day in July.

He’s spent all afternoon lugging boxes and bags from both his car and the removal van he’d rented until everything is piled up in its respective rooms waiting to be organised and unpacked when Merlin isn’t quite so exhausted.

He’s almost uncomfortably warm and downing his third glass of ice-cold water, stomach grumbling to remind him that he hasn’t eaten anything since lunchtime when he hears a crash from outside followed by a very colourful stream of curse words.

Curious, Merlin follows the sound, because bad language aside, he _swears_ he knows that voice from somewhere, as impossible as he knows that is. He picked a cottage in a middle-of-nowhere coastal village for a reason. He likes the quiet, the lull of the ocean and the anonymity of moving to a place most people have never heard of.

Stepping back out into the late summer evening that will soon be giving way to sunset and nightfall, Merlin spots the jeep that must have just pulled up outside next door —another cottage almost identical to his own— shopping bags standing neatly beside it with the exception of one, that seems to have upturned and spilled everything onto the driveway.

“Is everything okay?” he calls to the man who is bent double into the back of the vehicle.

“Well it was until the damned plastic bag broke and sent my pickled eggs hurtling to their doom— pickled eggs I’ve been looking forward to eating, I might add.”

The man stands then, revealing himself and Merlin’s knees nearly give way under him because this man looks _exactly_ like—

No. _No_. Merlin silently chastises himself. He’s not going there, not again. He’s not going to get hopeful and fanciful every time he spots an attractive blonde with blue eyes— he’s not going to keep looking for Arthur in every man he meets.

Not anymore.

“Wow, well you must really love pickled eggs for you to be so upset about their loss.” Merlin chuckles when the stranger smiles at him, all impossibly pink lips and endearingly crooked teeth that remind him of—

“I’ll let you in on a secret— pickled eggs are my _favourite_.” He laughs and Merlin’s heart almost stops because pickled eggs used to be—

“I have a jar if you want them,” Merlin can’t stop his mouth from running away with him. “I mean I just moved in so we might have to dig through a few kitchen boxes to find them but I know I brought them with me because nobody I know likes pickled eggs— even _I_ don’t like them really so I don’t know why I keep buying them…” he trails off, curses himself for rambling like an idiot in front of the (very attractive dressed in dark blue jeans and a white t-shirt with a deep v cut into the neck, hauntingly familiar in every other way) man who is now his neighbour.

“Ah, I was wondering when you were going to move in, it’ll be nice to have somebody make that place look lived in again. And I’ll be forever indebted to you, but I won’t turn down your offer of pickled eggs.”

Merlin snorts. “Who even says _indebted_ anymore?” he shakes his head when the man shrugs and grins at him boyishly. “Come on over when you’ve done unpacking your shopping, it’ll spoil outside in this heat.” He turns to head back inside and calls over his shoulder. “I’m Merlin by the way. Merlin Emrys!”

“Arthur Pendragon!” Merlin stops still for a moment, closes his eyes and swallows hard because that name… that voice and that _laugh_ — those _eyes_ . It’s all so familiar, so obvious but it can’t be. It _can’t be_ because he’s never been right before and—

“Merlin, are you alright?” the man — _Arthur_ — is suddenly by his side, looking at him worriedly.

“I’m fine,”

“Rubbish, you look like you’re about to pass out. Must be the heat, let's get you inside.” Arthur leaves no room for argument, guides him inside to sit on the overstuffed but comfortable sofa.

“But your shopping,” Merlin protests weakly.

“Will be fine for ten minutes, and can be replaced if necessary,” Arthur insists, already wandering into the kitchen for a glass of water like he knows this house as well as his own. Perhaps he does. “Here, can’t have my neighbour dying on me the moment I meet him.”

The word _dying_ has Merlin’s heart stuttering, and he takes the glass from Arthur simply for something to do. He’s not really thirsty, he’s just had three glasses.

“That’s better,” Arthur smiles a short while later, eyes crinkling at the corners and Merlin wants to scream and cry because this has to be his Arthur.

He _has_ to be. He feels too _known_ to be anybody else.

“The pickled eggs—”

“Can wait,” Arthur interrupts, too fond for strangers. “It was touch and go for a minute there, you know.”

Merlin huffs a laugh and rolls his eyes. “Whatever you say,”

“Hm, then how about, come to the beach with me later?” Arthur blurts, pink colouring his cheeks and eyes growing wide when he seems to realise just how forward he has been. “Sorry, I’m sorry. I’m not usually so—“

“I’d like to come to the beach with you, Arthur.” Merlin says before either of them can second-guess themselves, melts a little when Arthur smiles sheepishly.

“Not too blunt?”

Merlin shrugs. “Maybe to some, but for me it’s a nice change. I’m used to you—” he catches himself, hopes that Arthur doesn’t notice or question the slip up. “To men expecting me to somehow guess what they want like I’m some kind of mind reader.”

“But Merlin, if you _were_ a minder reader,” Arthur speaks slowly, leaning much too close (not close enough) even though they’re already sitting side by side, a teasing tone to his voice that Merlin would know, would _recognise_ anywhere. “Then you wouldn’t have to guess now, would you?”

Merlin rolls his eyes again. “It seems to me, Arthur Pendragon, new neighbour and lover of pickled eggs, that you’re a bit of a prat. Maybe I won’t come to the beach with you after all.”

Arthur laughs, bold and full bodied. Merlin feels fluttery inside. “It seems to me, M _er_ lin, new neighbour and giver of pickled eggs, that you’re going to come to the beach anyway. Even if I am a bit of a prat.”

“You say that like you already know me, Arthur,” Merlin chuckles, but he feels strange inside, like long dormant electricity is sparking awake just beneath the surface of his skin.

Arthur leans in closer still, so close Merlin can feel little puffs of breath against his lips. “Maybe, Merlin, I feel like I do.” For a single, delirious moment Merlin wonders if Arthur will kiss him.

But then he’s moving away, bashful and more beautiful than he has any right to be. “Merlin and Arthur, hm, what do you think? Coincidence or Fate?”

“I guess we’ll have to wait and see,”

“I guess we will.” Arthur smiles, gives him this _look_ that makes Merlin wonder if he’s as transparent as he feels— makes him wonder if even after all this time, their souls recognise one another. “I have something for you,”

Confusion creases Merlin’s brow. “For me? But we only just met—”

“I know, believe me I know how strange this all sounds but I was in the market this morning and I bought something— I don’t really even know what it is honestly but I was drawn to it so I bought it and then a few hours later I meet _you_ —” Arthur pauses, stands up looking unsure but determined. “Forgive me if I’m starting to sound like some kind of freak but there’s something about you Merlin, and I feel like this should belong to you.”

Arthur reaches into his back pocket, and a moment later hands Merlin an object wrapped in a small square piece of scarlet red cloth.

With trembling fingers Merlin unwraps the cloth to reveal… the sigil that had belonged to Arthur’s mother, that Arthur had given to him so long ago now he can barely recall it and that he himself had buried in Avalon some thirty years ago.

Unable to stop it, Merlin bursts into tears. “Arthur how do you even _have_ this?”

_It’s him. It has to be._

“I told you I found it at—”

“How can you not know what this is— what it _means_?” Merlin tries to calm down, he really does, but he’s shaking, hiccupping and sobbing as he does the unthinkable, stands up and throws himself right into Arthur’s arms, clings to him so tightly he’s sure neither of them can properly breathe. “Thank you, thank you so much,”

_Thank you for sending him back to me. I’ll never ask for anything again. I swear it._

Arthur must be confused at best, freaked out at worst, but if he’s either of those things he doesn’t say anything, simply folds Merlin into his arms and lets him cry into his neck. Eventually, when Merlin’s cried himself quiet, Arthur rubs his hands up and down the length of Merlin’s back a couple of times before stepping away, moving Merlin’s arms from where they’d been wrapped around Arthur to between them.

“I don’t understand how, or _why_ , but I know… I _remember_ , that this is important to you isn’t it?” Arthur curls his hands around Merlin’s, the sigil still clutched tightly in Merlin’s palms. “Important to _us_.”

All Merlin can do is nod, speechless, overwhelmed and falling in love all over again.

“Will you tell me?” Arthur asks. The waver in his voice makes Merlin look up to find Arthur’s eyes swimming with tears and bottom lip trembling. “Please Merlin, tell me why I picked this up, tell me why the moment I laid eyes on you I felt like whatever I’ve been missing my whole life has finally been _found_ ,”

Merlin nearly breaks down for the second time in front of this man, this beautiful man— this stranger he has known for more than a thousand years.

“I’ll tell you. Soon, I promise Arthur.” Merlin smiles, reaches out the way he’s done in his dreams countless times before and presses a hand to the place where once upon a millennia ago destiny had deemed it time to spill Arthur’s life blood until his heart simply stopped beating. “I’ll tell you everything you want to know,” he revels in the warmth beneath his hand, chokes back a sob when Arthur simply nods and brings a strong hand to rest over his.

Something passes across Arthur’s face then, the shadow of recognition, or perhaps the echo of pain, but Merlin blinks and it’s gone, replaced with a fondness he never thought he’d see again.

“Can we still go to the beach?”

“Of course,” Arthur laughs softly, squeezes his hand once before letting go. “Later or now?”

Merlin smiles. “Now. I’ll unpack later. You’ll have to lead though, I don’t know the way,”

Merlin nods towards the door, doesn't expect a response and so is surprised when Arthur steps forward, leans up because Merlin is slightly taller and presses a single, chaste kiss to his forehead.

It’s then that the feeling floods back in, electricity under his skin, fire in his veins that makes his blood sing— that feeling of something long since broken finally being made _whole_.

It follows him all the way to the beach (after a quick stop at Arthur’s house to actually put his shopping away), down the old cobbled paths and the coarse sand, warm between his toes when he kicks his shoes off, all the way down to the water's edge where they roll their jeans up to their knees and wade out into the cool ocean.

Only when Arthur turns to him, splashes him square in the face before wading off laughing in a way that’s so familiar he can feel it in his _bones_ does Merlin recognise the feeling for what it is. It’s not his love for Arthur that seems as old as time itself, and it’s not the elation of having Arthur back, even if he doesn't remember Merlin or the past, the _destiny_ they shared.

It’s magic. _His_ magic.

_I don’t want you to change. I want you to always, be you._

_You cannot lose who you are._

_You are Albion, Merlin._

Turning away from Arthur slightly, Merlin has to know, hopes and prays to the Gods that he’s not about to get his heart broken again when it doesn't work, cups his wet hands together and whispers into them, “ _Gewyrcan lif_ ,”

Taking a breath, Merlin opens his hands, and there are tears in his eyes when a brilliant blue butterfly flutters out and over to Arthur, who immediately stops dead and gazes at it with complete fascination.

“Merlin! A butterfly!” he sounds so joyful Merlin wants nothing more than to kiss him just so he can discover what happiness tastes like in Arthur’s mouth. “I’ve never seen one like that around here— so _blue_.”

It matches Arthur’s eyes, Merlin thinks. “It’s beautiful!” he shouts instead.

“Yeah,” Arthur says, softer now as he wades back over to him, looking at him in that same oddly knowing way as before. “Beautiful. Merlin?”

“Hm?”

“Will you push me away if I kiss you right now?” Arthur asks, already bringing a hand up to cup Merlin’s jaw.

“Never,” Merlin breathes, lost already. “I’ll never push you away.” _I love you and I’ve missed you so much._

They both lean in then, and when their noses bump gently they smile into the kiss that follows, right there in the water as the sun begins to sink below the horizon, sets the sky on fire and turns the ocean to liquid gold.

Arthur presses closer, kisses him deeper and Merlin threads his fingers into the back of Arthur’s hair, and kisses him back like he needs this embrace to breathe.

“Merlin,” Arthur whispers against his mouth, kisses him again.

“Arthur,” Merlin answers, presses tiny kisses to each corner of his mouth before capturing his lips again.

They separate a few moments later and Arthur takes Merlin’s face in both hands, gazes at him in a way he never has before and says, “I’m sorry I kept you waiting for so long,”

“You _remember_?” Merlin is crying again, tears streaking his face faster than Arthur can wipe them away. “Arthur, is it really you? _Arthur_ —”

 _Please don’t let it be an illusion again_.

Arthur kisses his tears away and joins their mouths again. All Merlin can taste is salt. The salt of the ocean, the salt of his tears and Arthur’s— it stings, somehow, the way it does when poured into an open wound but this time, _this time_ Merlin knows the pain means _healing_. “I remember that you saved me Merlin, over and over until you couldn’t anymore. I remember that I loved you as much as I loved Guinevere and I remember watching you wait, watching you cry for me and wanting nothing more than to be there by your side the way you’d always been by mine. I remember wanting you to know… that you weren’t the only one waiting. I waited until I couldn’t anymore… until there wasn’t a me left _to_ wait anymore.”

Merlin breathes in and chokes on a sob when it comes to him with startling, absolute clarity: Arthur was born again, nothing more than a tiny baby, suddenly and brilliantly _alive_ in this world the day Merlin buried that sigil.

The day he finally let go of Arthur’s spirit, his _soul_.

“Arthur,”

“There’s so much I still don’t understand. Things I need you to tell me— things _I_ need to tell _you_ , Merlin, that butterfly before… it wasn’t an ordinary butterfly was it?” Arthur pauses, thumbs stoking Merlin’s cheeks tenderly. “It was magic- _your_ magic.”

“Yes,” Merlin answers truthfully because he’s not hiding. Not this time. “It’s been gone for so long I thought—“

“I know, I _know_ , but it’s back now and it’s beautiful Merlin, do you hear me?” Arthur sounds like he’s pleading, almost desperate for Merlin to understand.

“I hear you. Stay with me this time?” Merlin asks and Arthur is kissing him again, fierce and all consuming— it’s a beautiful kind of storm surging between them.

A forest fire ignited by lightning that will burn brighter than all the stars in the universe.

“I’ll never leave you again.”

And so here it is that the ancient words Kilgharrah spoke ring true once more; this is not the end, it is the _beginning_.

Arthur is here in Merlin’s arms, whole and alive and _forever_ — living a lifetime in every kiss, every heartbeat. Merlin has his magic back, powerful and vibrant, wrapped around his soul _because_ of Arthur —his other half, his soulmate— and so in the end, the wheel of Fate is complete, their shared destiny finally fulfilled.

After more than fifteen hundred years, Merlin and Arthur are together again. After more than fifteen hundred years—

Albion is _free_.

*****

**Author's Note:**

> Please let me know what you thought and thank you so much for reading! ♡


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